Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Heretic’ on VOD, an idea-driven horror-thriller in which Hugh Grant shows his dark side

Heretic (now streaming on VOD services like Amazon Prime Video) shows us a side of Hugh Grant we’ve never seen before: The horror-movie antagonist. Now, he’s played a villain before, but Paddington 2 isn’t quite the prelude to his turn in A24‘s Heretic, where he plays a psycho-manipulator who draws a pair of young and naive Mormon women into his web. The film is written and directed by Scott Beck and Bryan Woods, who wrote A Quiet Place and directed Adam Driver dinosaur movie 65 – and now take a step forward with a nice, juicy horror-thriller.

HERETIC: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: Sister Paxton (Chloe East) vehemently denies watching porn. But that one time she got a glimpse of one of those videos, she saw in the woman’s eyes “divine confirmation.” Interesting! This tells us what we need to know about this Mormon missionary who, along with Sister Barnes (Sophie Thatcher), pedals a bicycle around town in her maxi skirt, hoping to convert whoever will listen to their spiel. It’s a rough go. They’re subject to bullies’ taunts about “magic underwear,” and “That South Park musical kinda makes fun of us,” Sister Paxton sighs. She’s more naive than Sister Barnes, but out in the cynical-slash-realist secular world, with their wide eyes and tryhard pasted-on cheery smiles and very youthful looks (they’re 20ish, maybe 23, 24), they’re both like lambs among the wolves.

Yet there’s always hope, even if you have to peer into a wolf’s den in hopes of finding it. Of course, at first they don’t realize they’re knocking on the door of a wolf’s den, but soon enough they get That Sinking Sensation. Let’s not get ahead of things, though. There’s a “Mr. Reed” on their list of interested candidates for Mormonism, so they find his house, lock their bikes to the gate and ring the doorbell. Above them, a storm gets increasingly drenchy. He finally answers and lets them in and promises them pie and the pending arrival of his wife who he says is baking the pie, and can’t you smell the blueberries? Mmm mmm good! He’s so very cheerful, this Mr. Reed. But his wife needs to be present in the room lest the Mormon rules be broken, our Sisters insist, and he promises she’s coming, she’s coming. 

So continue without her, they must. Mr. Reed is so very receptive and welcoming and we know he’s baiting these women – this is the benefit of being the movie watcher instead of the movie character – but do they? Not sure. Perhaps it’s not That Sinking Sensation but rather the awkwardness of complete strangers discussing religion so earnestly, and our Sisters just have to push through it. Well, this Mr. Reed, with the upbeat demeanor and bright, wide smile, he starts a rather deep discussion about the nature of belief, then whips out his Book of Mormon, which is tabbed and post-it-noted like someone who’s studied the living dook out of it. And then he starts carving up Mormonism like it’s a roast turkey. “How do you feel about polygamy?” he asks pointedly, but with a giant grin. And then, “What’s your favorite fast food?” Methinks Mr. Reed is f—ing with them. F—ing with them real hard.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: Heretic is part-conversation movie, part-horror movie, so it’s very roughly a mix of Barbarian or Don’t Breathe-type what’s-in-the-house-what’s-in-the-houuuuuuuussssssse movies and, I dunno, My Dinner With Andre? Hey, I said “roughly.”

Performance Worth Watching: Watching Grant go from the stammering charmer of all the best rom-coms (except Did You Hear About the Morgans? of course) to living deliciously as an evil manipulative creep with a rotten core? Delightful.

Memorable Dialogue: My two fave lines:

Mr. Reed: “My wife is shy – but the pie? The pie is nigh!”

Sister Barnes: “If I say ‘magic underwear,’ that means STAB.”

Sex and Skin: None.

Our Take: Things do not go well for Sister Barnes and Sister Paxton, and I’ll say no more. That’s no surprise, mind you – one doesn’t sit down to watch a film called Heretic with its sinister one-sheet and expect it to be nothing but spirited debates about divinity and religion. But that’s essentially what it is for roughly the first half, with Mr. Reed pulling out a Monopoly board and playing Radiohead (!) to illustrate his cogent points. Of course, he does all this in a manner calculated to escalate tension, and grow the feeling of unease within his wary subjects. 

The second half becomes more like a typical psycho-horror movie, with bursts of violence, an exploration of the grimiest nooks in Mr. Reed’s house and the implementation of the crackity-bones (crackity crackity bones bones bones!) sound effect. I worry that Beck and Woods shift into ludicrous speed out of obligation, to reward the gorehounds and specterfiends out there who just sat through 45 minutes of slow-burn talky debates about religion and really need some liquid to spill lest they log on and trash the film in the forums. 

But the ideas – all deeply unsettling, about why we believe what we believe, and the things we’re told and that we tell ourselves in order to make sense of the world – remain present even as the filmmakers put their characters in ominous basements with pointy letter openers in their pockets, and unknown who-knows-what lurking behind creaky old doors. And the performances are consistently scary, funny and thoughtful, with Thatcher and East showing more guile and spunk than you might expect, especially across from Grant’s savagely entertaining scenery-chewing. Take from Heretic what you will, be it the shocks and twists or its ruminations on the slippery-slope dangers of belief, or the lack thereof. I took it as a reminder that no matter the intensity of your passionate views, convincing someone that your way is the way is a fool’s errand. You might as well be teaching algebra to your cat.

Our Call: Heretic is fresh, amusing and freaky all at once. And Mr. Reed has the stuff of a minor-classic horror character. Believe it and STREAM IT.

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan.